Creator Of Activity-Tracking App Takes First Place In FAU’s 2019 Business Plan Competition

The inventor of an activity-tracking mobile app that establishes quantitative connections between health/usage data and psychological/physical well-being won first place and $10,000 in prize money at the annual Florida Atlantic University Business Plan Competition.

David Gorski, who was a senior at FAU’s Wilkes Honors College in Jupiter before he graduated a few weeks ago, founded the company, Life-Metrics, which outdistanced four other entries in the annual rivalry by coming up with an app that helps determine the benefit of exercise.

FAU’s Adams Center for Entrepreneurship and the College of Business hosted the event held at the FAU Office Depot Center on the Boca Raton campus.

The app, he said, “is still in development. It should be launched by the end of 2019.”

During the explanation phase of competition, Gorski said many people wear data-collecting devices while exercising. A jogger himself, the honors college student said he wears an instrument “that records a lot of data, which is neat, but it’s not very useful.”

By bringing this information together with cutting-edge machine learning, Life-Metrics aims to “create a world in which we all know precisely how our habits affect our lives.”

Earlier this year, Gorski won $2,500 for his venture as one of the winners of the Kenan Social Engagement Program Scholarship.

“It feels great knowing that people believe in my vision,” Gorski said. “A lot of the work of an entrepreneur is long nights without much direct reward, so it’s great to see people, especially other professionals and entrepreneurs, respond so positively to your work. There were a lot of great businesses and presenters at the Business Plan Competition, so to win is a great honor.”

His app, joined with measuring apparatus, can “tell you how to find happiness; how to find physical patterns and be healthy.” The intention, he indicated, is to cut through “all the noise that’s out there” to find specific evidence to come up with an effective health plan.

A South Florida resident, Gorski said he plans to attend the University of Pittsburgh to obtain a Ph.D. in physics.

Second place, with a $5,000 prize, went to Daisy, a nonprofit organization that aims to facilitate the donation of feminine hygiene products to homeless and at-risk women by selling “period kits” to shelters or homeless resource centers.

Daisy’s founder, Amanda Barstow, is also a Wilkes Honors College student and winner of a 2019 Kenan Social Engagement Program Scholarship that provided a $10,000 seed grant for her venture.

By participating in the Business Plan Competition, Barstow said: “I was also able to effectively workshop my business plan through suggestions made by various judges. There wasn’t one pitch where I didn’t receive useful feedback or an interesting idea to implement. All of this experience would have been reward enough for me but I also ended up with additional seed funding, which will make it possible for me to really get my idea off the ground.”

NERD, an autonomous robotic delivery service specializing in food and snack delivery on college campuses, took third place and earned $2,500. Using autonomous robots, NERD, which stands for NEarby Robotic Delivery, solves the last-mile delivery problem and helps increase staff and student productivity throughout the day.

“The biggest thing we gained out of this competition was experience,” said Alexander Roscoe, developer of NERD. “Being engineers, the whole process was a learning process. We were able to make valuable connections as well as gain exposure for our company.”

The People’s Choice winner of a $1,000 prize was MILÁMU, which aims to help eliminate skin deficiencies and enhance natural beauty by crafting 100 percent natural essential oil blends. The company also offers a line of bracelets and accessories made from semi-precious stones and pearls.

To positively impact the community, MILÁMU partners with a different philanthropic organization and donates up to 20 percent of purchases to the cause.

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